Wednesday, February 17, 2016

Tuesday, February 16, 2016

... but the Knoedler news keeps coming: "Jose Carlos Bergantinos Diaz, the alleged partner of Glafira Rosales in her sale of a cache of counterfeit paintings through the Knoedler Gallery, can be extradited to the United States, Spain’s National Court has ruled."

Saturday, February 13, 2016

In a review of works from the collection of Paul Allen at the Phillips, Pulitzer Prize winning critic Philip Kennicott tells us:

"But the problem with collecting masterworks of great artists is that the act of ownership is in itself a kind of theft, stealing from the public commons of genius. Put another way, once a work of art is important enough to be of interest to a man like Allen, it belongs to all of us. He may not know that, but we do."

Friday, February 12, 2016

The narrative of the week seems to be that we're seeing a "correction" in the art market. See here, for example, and here.

But I've never understood how that concept is supposed to apply to the art market. "Correcting" to what? Why do we assume the newer prices are correct and the older prices were incorrect? Sure, the newer price is lower. But how do we know that it is more "correct" than the old one?

Sunday, February 07, 2016

Ann Freedman has settled with the De Soles. The case against the gallery continues. "The settlement follows damaging testimony about how much Knoedler and Ms. Freedman earned from the sale of more than 30 fakes that were said to be by Abstract Expressionist masters but were actually painted by an all but unknown Chinese artist in the garage of his Queens home."

UPDATE: "A federal judge told jurors who have been hearing the fraud suit in Manhattan about the settlement and said that they should not speculate about the details or infer anything about the remaining case before them."

UPDATE 2: Jay Grimm on the news: "Freedman has claimed for years now that she too was a victim and that she was delighted that this case is going to trial so as to clear her name. Settling at this juncture does the exact opposite. From my perspective, then, the only logical way of interpreting the settlement is that Ann Freedman caved in because the trial was not going well for her."

Thursday, February 04, 2016

UPDATE: Purchase College's Jeff Taylor: "If a Chinese immigrant in Queens could do them all quite convincingly, one has to wonder how many other abstract expressionist fakes have been bought and sold."